What Animals Do They Use For Testing

Animals are used for a variety of purposes in the United States—for food and other products; in sports and entertainment; for companionship; for the production of enzymes, hormones, and other biological products; and in research, testing, and education. The largest apply of animals is in food and fiber production, accounting for over v billion vertebrates each year (U.South. Department of Agronomics, 1985). An estimated 110 million dogs and cats are household pets in the U.s.a.. Between 17 million and 22 million animals are estimated to be used annually in the United States in research, education, and testing. Almost 85 per centum of these are rats and mice, and less than 2 percentage are cats, dogs, and nonhuman primates (Role of Technology Assessment, 1986).

Animals are used in enquiry to improve the health and welfare of humans and animals and to gain basic knowledge that cannot exist gained in other ways. Research conducted on animals varies widely in its impact on the animal subjects themselves. One field of behavioral research consists of observations of animals living in colonies that simulate their natural environments but with acceptable nutrient supplies and no predators. In some inquiry projects, animals are subjected to experimental procedures then receive supportive care, because their long-term survival and the validation of methods are the goals of treatment (examples include the development of organ transplantation and chronic toxicology). Some research animals are subjected to toxic substances and painful procedures until they are disabled or die, as when determining the lethal dose of radiation used in cancer therapy. Some are killed to obtain an essential organ, such as the liver, to be used in further studies. Others are anesthetized, subjected to an experimental process, and killed without regaining consciousness.

Not only is there considerable variation in how animals are used, simply there is variation in how many and what types of animals are used in experiments.

Numbers of Animals Used

In 1952 the National Research Council established the Plant for Laboratory Animal Resources (ILAR) to serve as a coordinating agency and an information resource on the use of laboratory animals. In 1962, 1968, and 1978, ILAR conducted major surveys of laboratory animal facilities and resources, with the results of the 1978 survey being published by the U.Due south. Department of Health and Man Services (National Inquiry Council, 1980). The 1968 and 1978 ILAR surveys included about of the entities that utilize animals in biomedical research, including nonprofit, commercial, military, and federal organizations. ILAR is currently planning a quaternary survey.

The Beast and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) of the U.S. Section of Agriculture (USDA) too collects information on the extent of animal use. Each year APHIS prepares an Animal Welfare Enforcement Report, which summarizes the annual reports filed with APHIS by registered research facilities that apply animals in research (U.South. Department of Agriculture, 1972–1987). All registered research facilities are required to submit these reports. Institutions are not required to written report on their use of rats, mice, birds, and domestic farm animals used for research, but the almanac report form has space for voluntary reporting on the utilise of rats and mice.

Table 1 summarizes information from the ILAR and APHIS surveys and from estimates prepared by Health Designs, Inc., for the Function of Engineering science Assessment (1986). Equally demonstrated by the table, data from various sources show a lack of consistency. It should be noted that a considerable decrease was observed between 1967 and 1978 in the numbers of animals used as measured by ILAR. Recent annual reports from APHIS, yet, have shown that the total number of animals used in experimentation (excluding rats, mice, birds, and wild animals) increased from 1,571,693 in 1983 to 1,633,933 in 1986 (U.South. Department of Agriculture, 1972–1987). The Office of Technology Assessment (1986), in evaluating all the data, has concluded that the available data are as well imprecise to let whatsoever conclusions to be fabricated regarding recent trends in overall animal apply. The ILAR survey being planned will provide more than current information on animal use.

TABLE i

Various Estimates of the Number of Animals Used in the United States.

Use of Animals in Enquiry past the Federal Government

The federal regime is a major user of inquiry animals. Specifically, the following departments and agencies use animals for intramural inquiry and testing (Office of Technology Assessment, 1986).

The U.Due south. Section of Agriculture conducts research with animals to improve brute wellness and the quality of animal products, such equally food and fiber.
The U.South. Department of Defense conducts experimental research in a wide variety of areas, with animals being used past the Air Force, the Ground forces, the Navy, the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, the Defense Nuclear Agency, and the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology.
The U.South. Section of Free energy conducts enquiry on the health and ecology effects of energy technologies and programs. Most of this research takes place at the privately managed national laboratories—such as Brookhaven National Laboratory, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and the Pacific Northwest Laboratories—and through contracts and grants to scientists employed at universities and other enquiry facilities.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services carries out intramural fauna enquiry or testing within four of its components: the National Institutes of Health (NIH); the Food and Drug Assistants (FDA); the National Constitute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), which is office of the Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and Mental Health Administration (ADAMHA); and the National Constitute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), which is part of the Centers for Illness Control. NIH is the largest of these four components and uses more animals than any other federal section or agency.
The U.S. Department of the Interior, in cooperation with state and private organizations, conducts research and pedagogy programs to improve fish and wildlife resource management.
The U.S. Department of Transportation conducts research on transportation prophylactic using animals under the authority of the Hazardous Transportation Deed of 1974 and the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act of 1966.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) conducts tests to determine the toxic potential of consumer products.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) performs inquiry involving animals under the statutory and regulatory authority of the Toxic Substances Command Human activity and the Federal. Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Human action.
The National Helmsmanship and Space Administration (NASA) conducts research with animals to acquire knowledge that tin be used to protect the health of astronauts, both during their missions in space and afterward their render to world.
The Veterans Administration (VA) uses animals in its research and evolution divisions and in its pedagogy programs.

The Office of Engineering Cess (1986) has estimated that the total federal use of animals in 1983 was 1.6 million, with virtually xc percent of these animals beingness rats and mice.

Use of Animals in Instruction

The number of animals used in educational activity is unknown, only almost observers retrieve that it is relatively modest. For example, an estimated 53,000 animals are used annually for teaching in medical and veterinary schools (Office of Engineering science Cess, 1986). Even so, fauna utilize in high schools and colleges might exist about people'southward merely contact with laboratory animals, making it an of import determinant of how the public feels about such use. This topic is outside the charge of the commission, but the contempo written report by the Office of Technology Assessment (1986) examines the issue in some detail.

Use of Animals in Testing

Animals are used extensively to exam the safety and efficacy of compounds produced by the chemic, cosmetic, and drug industries. The utilize of so many animals, particularly rats and mice, in testing cannot be ignored even though the commission was charged primarily with looking at the utilize of animals in research. Government regulatory agencies, such equally FDA, EPA, CPSC, and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), oft explicitly crave the utilize of animals in testing. A list of some commonly used tests follows (Part of Engineering Assessment, 1986). Descriptions of possible alternative methods can be institute in Affiliate four.

Acute toxicity tests consist of single doses at concentrations high enough to produce toxic furnishings or death. They are often used to screen substances for relative toxicity. The LD_fifty, which is the dose of a exam substance at which half the test animals can be expected to die, is one such test.
Center and peel irritation tests, which ordinarily consist of a single exposure, are by and large used to develop warnings for handling and to predict the toxicity of adventitious exposure. The virtually common method used to test eye irritation is the Draize test, in which a exam substance is applied to one eye of an adult rabbit, with the untreated centre serving as a control (Draize et al., 1944).
Repeated-dose chronic toxicity tests entail repeated exposures to substances for periods of 2 weeks to more a year to decide the possible effects of long-term exposure. Rats are most normally used for these tests.
Carcinogenicity tests involve repeated exposures to substances for nigh of an animal'due south lifespan to detect possible homo carcinogens.
Developmental and reproductive toxicity tests consist of a variety of procedures to make up one's mind the potential of foreign substances to crusade infertility, miscarriages, and nascency defects. Rats and rabbits are the virtually commonly used animal subjects.
Neurotoxicity tests employ a diverseness of doses and exposures to determine toxic effects on the nervous system. Toxic finish points include behavioral changes, lack of coordination, motor disorders, and learning disabilities in animals.
Mutagenicity tests include a variety of methods for determining whether genetic material of germ or somatic cells has been changed.
Biological screening tests investigate the biological activity of organic compounds. Animals may be used in these tests depending on the type of biological action being investigated.

Most of the in a higher place-mentioned tests require the use of big numbers of animals. However, as mentioned earlier, the number of animals used in testing is not known. Most testing is thought to exist conducted in private commercial establishments that use primarily rats and mice, which under current regulations are not subject to the reporting requirements of the Animal Welfare Act. A recent judge of the total number of animals used in testing was ''several'' million (Function of Technology Assessment, 1986). Another written report (Theta Corporation, 1986) estimated that the utilize of animals in testing and industrial inquiry is considerably greater than that, with organizations outside of government and academia accounting for over 75 per centum of the estimated 22 1000000 laboratory animals used annually. Of these animals, rodents past far are used in the greatest numbers.

New Technologies and Future Laboratory Use of Animals

The new and chop-chop expanding field of biotechnology will have an bear on on the species and numbers of laboratory animals used, but it is besides early to predict precisely its ultimate effects. In some cases, the number of animals used might be reduced as biotechnology provides new testing methods adequate to governmental regulatory regime. In other cases, biotechnology might crusade a demand for more animals as well as shifts in the relative numbers of various species of animals used. At present, the biotechnology industry in the Usa purchases an estimated xi pct of all laboratory rodents sold, nigh 5 percent of the swine, and about 2 percent of the rabbits and dogs, only few primates or cats (Theta Corporation, 1986).

Several effects of biotechnology tin can already be seen. Rabies virus is widely distributed in nature. It was initially studied by infecting live laboratory animals with the virus, which led to vaccines produced using alive animals. Recently, new diagnostic tests have been developed that apply monoclonal antibodies produced by cell cultures, and vaccines are being produced with recombinant Deoxyribonucleic acid technology (Freiherr, 1986). These changes have greatly reduced the utilize of animals for this purpose.

Proteins such as growth hormone and insulin can now exist made using bioengineering techniques. Although this method of production will not eliminate the use of animals, it may reduce the number used per product, because safe tests can and then exist performed with larger batches of a uniform product.

The increasing sophistication in determining molecular structure and using it to predict biochemical part may reduce the use of animals. Scientists can use advances in technology to determine the active sites of molecules and even the attachment sites of viruses.

Such data may allow drug synthesis to proceed in a more directed fashion. New compounds developed in this way will withal require safety and efficacy testing in animals. Animals will likewise yet exist needed for the validation of predicted results.

The numbers of particular animals used could modify. For example, more mice might exist used, considering transgenic mice produced by the microinjection of DNA into fertilized mouse eggs institute a powerful system for the study of specific genes (Bieberich and Scangos, 1986).

Summary

No comprehensive information on the use of animals for research, testing, and education in the private sector are bachelor, and trends in this use are hard to gauge. Federal in-firm apply amounts to nigh ane.six million animals, or less than ten per centum of the estimated 17 meg to 22 meg animals used annually for research, education, and testing in the Usa. A uniform system of reporting, while costly, would assist to decide more accurately the numbers of animals used in inquiry, which would brand it possible to assess the impact of policy on trends in animal use. Animals are used extensively in testing the rubber and efficacy of compounds produced by the chemical, cosmetic, and drug industries. Unremarkably used tests include those for acute toxicity, heart and skin irritation, repeated-dose chronic toxicity, carcinogenicity, developmental and reproductive toxicity, neurotoxicity, mutagenicity, and biological screening. Future technologies might afford ways of reducing creature utilize, or they might lead to a demand for more animals or to shifts in the relative numbers of different species used.

Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK218261/

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